The Round About Direction
by cocoalily
Summary: Written for CurrerBell@HPFF's Pimp My Cliche challenge. My cliche: Sirius Black is the playboy of Hogwarts, going from one girl to the next at the same rate normal people change socks. But what happens when the misfit of Gryffindor catches his eye?
1. A Not So Good Morning

Elise watched in incredulity like she always did as one of the girls a year older than her smiled and fluttered her lashes in

Elise watched in incredulity like she always did as one of the girls a year older than her smiled and fluttered her lashes in the direction of the Marauders - or, more specifically, Sirius. Why they found him attractive was beyond her. He was uglier than a…well, not ivery/i good-looking…sod that. She turned away, eyeing her plate of food in slight disgust. He was sexy and she couldn't deny it. Who could? Three quarters of the girls in school would have waited at his beck and call just for one of his smiles (the other quarter were either oblivious to the world or already had a significant other that they were enamored of).

Elise seemed to be one of the few that saw the light on the subject of his personality, though. Sure, his swagger was enough to capture the eyes of the school, his smirk seemingly able to capture their hearts as well. However, why couldn't they ever see that he wasn't all wonderful? It was plain enough from the day he first asked a girl out, dumping her in the next ten minutes for a prettier face, that he wasn't the type that would ever have a long-lasting relationship, much less a meaningful one. It was plain that he only wanted a good shag, preferably with the prettiest faces.

Jabbing a fork in her mashed potatoes before pushing her plate away, Elise stood up. The girl, a seventh year she now identified as Donna, was making a fool out of herself by crunching herself next to Sirius, who's hand was precariously close to her backside for comfort (and for that matter, eating as well). By the way Donna was giggling and winking at him in a decidedly suggestive manner Elise figured she'd be best off avoiding opening any broom closets for the next few hours. It'd most likely save her quite a lot of visual scarring.

Stalking out into the corridor in a very irritable manner, she swung her book bag over her shoulder. It wasn't as if she iwanted/i to see the same sodding display every morning before she went to classes. It put her in a not-so-lovely mood for the first class of the day, thus transferring to her assignments for the class which were generally slathered in snide pennings and crude characterizations that looked oddly like Sirius and whichever big-boobed wonder he was currently with. It was a wonder she managed to scrape A's at all with what the Professor had to read through.

"Elise! Finished early again?" A much-too-cheerful male voice caught Elise by slight surprise and she turned to face them. It was Russell, a half grin adorning his face as he jogged to catch up with her.

"Honest, Russ," she said grumpily, turning away from the dark-haired Hufflepuff and continuing to walk toward the Defense classroom. "If it would've been anyone but you they would've already been pined to the wall by my elbows. That's where you'll be too if you don't get that rotten igrin/i off your face."

Russell edged away from her side where he'd been walking, eyeing her elbows warily as the smile slid off his face. "In a rotten mood I suppose. Saw Sirius' newest embellishment?"

Elise picked up her pace and glared straight ahead, not bothering to answer. She didn't need to be reminded of the sight she'd seen, not when she was already in a mood about it. The morning hadn't started off good in the dormitory either, the girls had been arguing about the merits of push-up bras. It wasn't the loveliest thing to wake up to, and the snuggle-session at the table had put the icing on the cake.

"…s'there every morning, you oughta be used to it by now," Russell finished in an irritatingly iI-know-I'm-right/i voice, his eyes still trained on her elbows. "And the bloke can't help it. He's obviously got a disorder."

Elise snorted at the statement, a small smile appearing before fluttering away. "He must. Don't care though, I still don't like seeing him and whichever girl he's hooked that morning nearly snog." She glanced over at him, raising her eyebrows. "I heard he skips first class nearly every second day. I wonder what for," she asked in a wryly suggestive tone of voice. Not that she honestly wanted to think about it, but she couldn't help wonder how many broom closets had been idirtied/i in his early-morning antics.

Russell blanched visibly, staring at Elise as if she were crazy. "You terrible woman, making me think about that!" He scrubbed at his eyes in a comical manner as if trying to get the image out of them before grinning at her. "I'm willing to bet he's in the one on the fourth floor."

Elise made an attempt to jab him with her elbow that was dodged easily. "You're as bad as I am," she groaned in an irritable tone of voice, though she was just barely holding back a grin. "Next thing I know you'll be trying to get me to go up there with you and check it."

Russell choked slightly as she said the last statement. "Bloody insane! You can go look if you want, I'm not willing to go blind this early in life. That—"

"I go in here," Elise interrupted Russel before he could start ranting on about the horrors of the sight he might see, giving him another jab to the arm. "Be good in your next class, don't go running off looking for trouble. Or broom closets, for that matter," she added almost as an afterthought before pulling the door to the classroom open and stepping inside, leaving Russ standing outside of it looking flabbergasted.

Class, as she had surmised, was turning out to not be the best of things for her early-morning tendencies. Professor Thornward had started by chirpily announcing that they were in for a surprise quiz. Elise let out a groan. Surprise quizzes boded no good as she kept her studying to a minimum, preferring to scrape her way by with memory. It was easier that way, albeit slightly more stressful.

"Would you all please find a piece of parchment and write your name on it?" she asked, the tone of her voice belying the fact that she'd asked a question. Clearly they weren't allowed to say 'no, please' in this situation. "The questions," she waved her wand, the questions immediately appearing on the chalkboard behind her in scripted white writing, "are here. Ready, begin!"

Elise had just managed to pull out her ink bottle and quill as the Professor had gone through the motions to indicate that they should start. Surprise quizzes indeed. Oh, how she loathed them! Eyeing the first question (i'What is one of the magical creatures spends its day in recluse but hunts by night?'/i) she frowned. There was something vaguely familiar about it. Perhaps they'd been lectured on it sometime in the past week. iIf you're so desperate to know, why don't you look over your notes?/i she scrawled on the answer blank after a moment more of thinking. Her grade was high enough that even if she did fail the surprise quiz she'd still have an A.

The rest of the quiz was filled with various impertinent answers. Elise paused before she stood up to turn it in, glancing them over, her bad mood rapidly dissolving. Ah, the wonders of surprise quizzes! If she could only take one every time she was in a strop she'd be set for life. After all, people of influence idid/i seem to have a fetish for garish smiles and attitudes bright enough to light a fire.

He pile of papers on Professor Thornward's desk was growing visibly higher by the second as the papers piled on. As Elise set her own on the top of the teetering stack even she had to admit that it seemed as if there as an overabundance of parchment. The Professor stood up as the last paper was set on, eyeing drifting to it with a look of bafflement before snapping back to the class. "I'm sure you all did brilliant on your quizzes," she said, her voice its nauseatingly cheery self again. "For the rest of class you're to take twelve inches of notes on this." Taking the place of the questions for the surprise quiz was a chalkboard horrifyingly crowded with words. "You may begin."

Elise cocked an eyebrow at her Professor's inane cheerful attitude. It almost seemed as if she were mocking the class for having to do whatever she found useful to thrust on them. Quickly pulling out a sheet of parchment, she arranged it on her desk so it looked as though she were taking notes before turning back to stare at the Professors bobbing head as she read through one of the quizzes. It was soon marked full of red, enough so that Elise found herself wondering for the first time if she was putting them all on with her chirpiness. The fact that she seemed to be—craning her head slightly forward, she squinted. Was she? It certainly looked as though she were smirking as she marked a second paper full of red circles and bold check marks.

The head immediately snapped up and Elise jerked upward. Apparently Professor Thornward had felt her staring at her head. "Miss White, I don't see you taking notes. I'd advise you to start doing so immediately." Elise, turning a pale shade of red, nodded sharply before dipping her quill into the ink. The Professor had eyes in the top of her head, there was no other explanation for it. iDonna and Sirius, sitting in a tree. SHAGGIN/i She frowned. That didn't work out, there were too many letters. iSNOGGIN/i That didn't work either, and kissing was much to soft a term for what she was sure was going on between the player and the arse-pinching Donna.

There was a sudden low rumble as many pairs of feet hit the floor. Elise jerked up for the second time that class period. It was a sodding stampede! Students were making a mad dash for the door in an attempt to escape the classroom of what she was sure qualified as doom. Quickly hopping off her chair, she only managed to join the throngs of students pushing their way over to the door before being trampled like a chicken in a horse race. Perhaps she wasn't the only one who disliked the class.

A very large boy, one who had just somehow managed to vault his vast bottom over her whole desk, stepped rudely on Elise's foot as he shove his way to the door. Glaring daggers at his back as she stumbled forward, she found herself nearly being trampled once again. Where all of the students had appeared from was beyond her. The morning Defense class had never yet seemed quite so large.

The door was right in her sight line. However, it seemed her Professor had other plans. "Miss White," she said briskly, grasping her arm to prevent her from escaping the classroom and waving she piece of parchment Elise had done the surprise quiz on. "Detention tomorrow evening, six thirty for impudence. Have this redone by then." After handing the paper over she stalked back to the area behind her desk, miraculously managing to avoid any collisions.

Face once more the picture of irritability, Elise made her way outside the door to find Russell lazing against the wall, eyeing the door and the now rapidly disappearing horde of students in a manner that suggested he'd been standing there for quite some time. The going was slow and awkward due to a certain sore appendage, and Russell was only just managing to hold in laughter as he watched her pick her way over.

"S'not funny," Elise grumbled, glaring at the older boy as his face grew steadily redder from the effort of hiding his amusement. "A whale blubber boy stepped on my foot and—ow!" she complained as she attempted to step on it. "—and Thornward gave me detention just for answering questions. What else did she want me to do, write her a bloody essay to go along with it?" Gingerly placing pressure on her bruised foot, she shrugged innocently as Russell eyed her in a more-than-suspicious manner.

"What d'you mean, just answered the questions?" he asked. "Don't give me that load of shit, I know a lie when I see one. You don't get detention for ijust answering the questions./i"

"I did!" she protested, before leaning against the wall and chuckling as she shoved the thoroughly red-marked paper in his face. "Alright, so I…embellished them a little. But I still did write answers." The raised her eyebrows at him, pursing her lips. It wasn't a lie, she'd just not answered them correctly. "Basically told her to get her hindquarters in motion and find the answers herself if she wanted to know so badly."

Russell groaned as he scanned it over. "Elise…"

"I know, I know," she said, tapping her fingers on the wall behind her as she eyed the ceiling. She should have known better than to tell Russell, he'd just give her a hard time about it being the honest Hufflepuff he was. It was one of the only dark spots she could see in their friendship – things she found funny generally weren't approved of by him. "I couldn't help it though. Mornings aren't my best time of day."

"I'll say." Glancing at a clock that was placed conveniently on the wall across from them, she pulled away from the wall quickly, wincing as she realized a second too late that her foot was still sore and she'd just placed all her body weight on it. "Class in two minutes, I have to run. Meet me at dinner?"

He nodded, stretching as he pushed himself off of the wall. "Will do, White. Take care, don't get another detention." Elise rolled her eyes in his direction at his serious warning before limping her way down the hallway to yet another hour of misery. One class down, a good six to go. iSweet Merlin./i


	2. The Exasperating Variety

Elise wasn't displeased with how classes had gone

Elise wasn't displeased with how classes had gone. However, she wasn't exactly pleased either. Thankfully there was still only one detention to serve, but it had occupied her mind for the remainder of the day, causing her to lose a good fifteen – or was it twenty? She couldn't recall – points from Gryffindor.

Not that she cared all that much, though, she was steadily losing hope in the house of supposed bravery and chivalry every day that passed.

Seating herself at an empty section of the table, Elise immediately began filling her plate. Even though her day had been less-than-fantastic it wasn't going to deter her from feeding herself. In fact, she decided as she scooped a large spoonful of casserole into her mouth, it had only made her hungrier. It felt as though her stomach had been deprived for days. Come to think of it, it had been nearly four hours since she'd eaten anything if she didn't count the bit of chocolate she'd eaten during History of Magic.

There was a sudden giggle, and Elise caught a whiff of flowery scent, soon followed by a trace of something more masculine. She paused her eating, glancing up. She'd sat in an empty section, surely no one would be--

She completely froze. This wasn't happening! A head of bouncy light brown hair was bobbing not two seats away from her, pressed nearly flat against someone taller and darker who was currently spooning himself food greedily.

"Good Merlin, you saps," she growled under her breath, pushing back her chair forcefully as she stood up. Donna and Sirius just had to choose this side of the table to sit at and interrupt her lovely meal of bean casserole, which was looking decidedly worse with each passing moment. She'd have to sit somewhere else for the remainder of the meal, someplace that wasn't icontaminated/i by soppy lovesick girls and boys that were much to handsome and self-absorbed for their own good.

Donna smiled in an altogether too innocent manner, fluttering her overly long eyelashes in Sirius' direction. Didn't they get in the way? Certainly that much mascara couldn't be comfortable in the least. Elise turned. She wasn't at all interested in watching the sickening display before her any longer. Hopefully Russell wouldn't mind her sitting with him for the time being.

As she stalked away she thought she recognized a faint croon coming from Donna, only to hear Sirius chuckle. It was positively revolting. Didn't she realize what a fool she was making of herself?

"Scoot a cheek," she mumbled as she slid into a seat next to Russell at the Hufflepuff table. He and the boys surrounding him stopped talking for a moment, eyeing her (or perhaps it was her obviously marked Gryffindor robes) curiously.

"Er, Elise—this is Elise White, mates—what're you doing?" Russell asked after an awkward pause. "I mean, it's fine if you sit here, but you're…"

Elise selected a plate, piling it up with something that vaguely resembled the casserole she'd been eating earlier as she spoke. "Sirius with Donna." She smiled wryly at him. "They happened to sit next to me and I decided to escape before they started snogging."

There was a chuckle from the blonde-haired boy sitting across from her. "I don't blame you! I'm in double potions with the two of them and it's nauseating." He paused, frowning slightly as he pondered something. "Forgot to mention, I'm—"

"Thaddeus," Russell and the boy on his other side interrupted simultaneously, mischievous grins in place.

"Not Thaddeus!" he protested loudly. "Ted. Hate the name Thaddeus. My mum and dad must've been sick to the head when they named me." He shook his head, blonde hair rumpled.

"C'mon, Ted, you know you love it," the dark-skinned boy who'd interrupted Ted earlier teased before turning and grinning at Elise, who's head was spinning from the rapid exchange. "That's Jonnie D, and no, the D doesn't mean anything," he said, pointing to a younger boy who hadn't said a word yet but had a smirk perched on his lips. "And I'm Aaron. S'good to see you've come to your senses and abandoned the Gryffs."

"Yeah," Elise said slowly, her fork still stabbed into the goop on her plate, which was looking particularly soggy and not at all appetizing.

Russell, who for the past minute had been shoveling food into his mouth as though he were about to fade away, belched loudly and leaned back against the chair. "Oi, Jonnie D, you're in sixth year, eh?"

"Yeah," he replied. "Why?"

He rolled his eyes. "Cos that's what Elise is, you thick head. Elise, your problems are solved!"

Elise had taken that moment to take a bite of the soggy substance on her plate and choked, and not only because of the horrid taste. "What?" she asked after coughing up a particularly disgusting bit of cauliflower into her napkin, eyes slightly watery. "My problems?"

Jonnie D was looking skeptical, his gaze flicking back and forth between Elise and Russell. The others were looking on with bemused expressions. Her Hufflepuff friend, however, was unperturbed. "Yeah. You're not doing so good in Defense, are you?" Not waiting for her to respond, he continued. "Jonnie D is our resident genius, and since he's in your year, he'd be glad to tutor you."

Here both Elise and Jonnie D started spluttering. "I don't need tutoring!" she finally managed to burst out indignantly while the other boy slumped down in his chair silently, Ted and Aaron eyeing him with amused expressions. It wasn't amusing, though…how on Earth it could be when her when she was being made a fool of was incomprehensible to her.

"Yes you do. I saw your quiz score, and if you ever want to be able to make it up." Russell had an annoyingly smug expression on his face. He was right, Elise admitted grudgingly, but she wasn't about to say that aloud.

"Jonnie D's up to it," Ted said loudly, thumping the boy on this back with a fist. "Eh mate?" The grin on his face was the complete opposite of Jonnie D's expression, which was obstinate and sullen.

Elise was starting to feel a bit sorry for him. It wasn't his fault he was being forced to tutor her (not that she needed it). No, Russell and his oh-so-lovely chums had forced it upon him. "Maybe he doesn't want to," she said, eyeing the said boy as she spoke. "And for the second time, I don't need tutoring!"

"It's fine," a smooth voice said. Elise's head snapped over to the speaker. It was the first time Jonnie D had spoken coherently, and his voice was decidedly nice. In fact, she might go as far as to call it sexy. If the rest of him was as sleek – no, that sounded plain odd. If the rest of him was as isexy/i as his voice was she might be attracted to him. However, since it wasn't (his face was pale and not all that attractive, his hair a bit too short for her liking and a mousy shade of brown) she figured he was a far cry from delectably material even if his voice was nice.

Elise shook her head slowly. "I don't—"

"Saturday morning, in the library," Russell said in a decisive tone of voice that clearly said he would brook no arguments.

Elise nodded grudgingly in defeated agreement before standing up to leave. She wasn't at all in the mood to talk to Russell any longer and her food was most definitely not edible anymore. "I'm off, fellows," she said, casting a quick smile at the assembled group.

"Aye-aye, cap'n. You eating here from now on?" Aaron asked, twirling a butter knife between his fingers lazily. Ted and Jonnie D (who hadn't said another word since he'd agreed to tutor her) nodded in agreement to the question.

"Yeah," she said in a spur-of-the-moment decision. It'd be a nice break from her usual silent meals even if she ended up talking more than she ate. "Well, er…I'll see you all in the morning I suppose?"

Four heads bobbed. Elise bit back a chuckle at their crow-like appearances before turning and striding off. Screw Gryffindor, Hufflepuff was much more interesting even if it did involve unwanted tutor sessions with sleek-voiced mongrels and friends who did nothing to help prevent said sessions from happening.

Being that it was Saturday Elise was thankfully able to sleep in late. The fact that there were no classes, just like any normal weekend day, was still bound to put her in a good mood when she woke up. After all, even though for the majority of the week she was surly and unwelcoming, she was a teenage girl who wasn't at all fond of mornings. The bad disposition was only to be expected.

She woke to a sunny dorm, blissfully empty. Elise vaguely remembered their shrill voices from earlier in the morning as they primped and preened themselves before traipsing down the stairs. Why they had woken so early was beyond her. However, instead of bothering to fully wake up and ask why they were up at such a dreadful hour, she burrowed deeper under her blankets and in a matter of seconds had promptly fallen back asleep.

After taking a quick shower and dressing, she headed down the stairs. However, instead of a bustling common room, she found it to be empty and dead silent. It was an odd happening and more than slightly disconcerting.

A sudden burst of far-off laughter from an open window caught her ear as a dull, metallic thud rang out. Elise felt like smacking herself. Of course, she should have remembered. It was the day of Quidditch tryouts, and the whole Gryffindor house was going to be outdoors either watching or trying out for the team. Elise had read the notice herself when it had been posted a week ago on the third or fourth day of school and had been meaning to go. Now there was hardly any point in going since it was nearly over, but if she ran...it was worth a try. After all, even though she wasn't a big Quidditch fan, she found the tryouts to be more than amusing.

A glance at the time told her Elise wasn't as late as she'd thought she was originally. There was still a good forty minutes of the ninety left, which meant that although she wouldn't get to see keeper and possibly chaser tryouts, she'd be there for remainder of them.

It took only a few minutes to reach the pitch. Elise, breathing heavily from jogging the whole way there, surveyed the area before quickly making her way up the stairs and sitting down next to what looked from the corner of her eye to be a brown haired girl. She didn't recognize her due to the fact that she was turned away gazing at the left side of the field, but then again, Elise didn't put it upon herself to try memorize everyone's names. It was very unrewarding as nine times out of ten the person could remember what iher/i name was.

The stands erupted once again in laughter as one of the students trying out for beater dropped her bat onto another's head as he rose into the air. Elise found herself chuckling with them as the girl's mouth flopped open in shock before he dropped off her hovering broom in slow motion, landing in a heap on both her bat and the freshly conked boy.

"What's the point?" the girl next to her asked loudly. Elise turned to respond that she honestly had no idea, but it was hysterical all the same, but before she could, a whiff a flowery scent wafted by her and the brown-haired girl turned toward Elise, who realized too late she'd made a strangled sort of squawking noise.

"Pardon? I didn't catch that," the newly-recognized Donna said politely, blinking in the innocent manner she'd had begun to detest.

Clearing her throat dryly, Elise shook her head. "I just, er, swallowed something." Inching away from her slowly, she mentally cursed the fates that had decided to seat her next to Donna, who was obviously not here for Quidditch but for her idarling/i boyfriend who probably couldn't care less about whether she came or not.

"It sounded more like you said something, but—oh, would you just ilook/i at him!" he gaze shifted suddenly from Elise to a bare-chested player who had kicked his broom up into the air and was hovering, shouting something incomprehensible at a young boy who was waving his bat around wildly in the air before the bludgers had been released. It was definitely Sirius – not that she could see his features from the distance, but by the way Donna was gazing at him with a far-off, fuzzy look.

That and the fact that she could see her fingers move in an unmistakably pinch-like gesture. This was proof of the fact that Donna liked Sirius' derriere much more than Elise cared to realize.

"It's not worth it," she found herself saying after a minute or so of complete silence in which Donna had no once taken her eyes off of the still shouting Sirius. "He's…it won't last long. At all." She stopped. Why on Earth had she started warning iDonna/i of all people to beware of his destructive sort of hobby?

Donna tore her eyes off of him, which was quiet a feat in itself, and managed to speak (Elise found this even more amazing). "It's different with me," she whinged, her brows crumpling into a frown. "He said he thought I was—"

"I don't want to hear what he said you were," Elise said, well aware of the fact that she was being rude by cutting Donna off mid-sentence. She knew she shouldn't have said anything. The older girl could have learned the lesson herself had Elise just kept her mouth shut. Standing up – Sirius had finished shouting and the players trying out were no longer having any issues of interest – she turned and began making her way down the stairs, half expecting Donna to burst out with a snippy reply.

She didn't, though. Elise grudgingly cast a glance backward at her, anticipating a nasty glare being shot at her back. Donna, however, was once again gazing dove-eyed at the dark-haired boy patrolling the Quidditch Pitch. Shaking her head at her thickheaded obliviousness, Elise ambled off the field. She should have known to not even try.

As she traipsed through the castle, Elise found herself almost wishing she were back at the Pitch watching Tryouts. For a while she'd tried to locate Russell, but after literally stumbling into Aaron and Ted and talking to them for a bit, she found out that he was in the Hufflepuff Commons with Jonnie D "just sitting." This explanation had come after a bit of stuttering, which she found very suspicious, but neither of them changed their answer so she was forced eventually to accept the fact that they might be "just sitting."

The two boys eventually wandered off, leaving Elise to continue walking aimlessly to no particular destination with absolutely nothing to do. It was, to sum it up in, utterly iboring./i Dinner wasn't for another hour, and although she could to her schoolwork, she didn't want to. After all, who did homework on Saturdays? It was positively unheard of!

The minutes dragged by, and after taking a turn down a corridor she swore she'd never been in before, Elise found herself standing in front of the Fat Lady.

"Password, m'dear?" she asked after yawning largely. "Don't just stand there and stare at me like I'm a Hippopotamus escaped from one of those Muggle…oh, what're they called again?" Her voice trailed off, leaving a silence in which Elise was itching to tell her that she actually did look just like hippopotamus, at least in size. Instead, though, she muttered out the password before stepping inside the common room.

It was crowded once again, Gryffindors milling around and chatting about who knew what. Instead of sitting down, though, Elise immediately strode over the dormitory stairs. If the common room was indeed this full, chances were her dormitory would be empty and she'd be able to enjoy a few minutes of peace and quiet with her chocolate before heading down to dinner.

Fate was not on her side. The moment she opened the door a wave of shrill voices hit her.

"It's not!" Anna, or a voice vaguely resembling Elise's black-haired dormmate, shrieked indignantly.

The second girl, her face a rather striking shade of mauve, was shaking her head at every word the first girl was saying. "It is too! Slick is so much better it's not—"

"No," Anna protested. "No, no, no. I don't believe you!" She swiveled around as the door slammed shut behind Elise. "Tell Mabel that lipstick is better than lip gloss."

She rolled her eyes. Having roomed with Anna and Mabel for the going on six years she should have known it wouldn't be anything more than just that – a disagreement over ilipstick/i and ilip gloss/i. "You're both being cows." Her ears were still ringing slightly from the encounter, and it was not making her any happier. "And if I did know which was better, which I don't," she added quickly as Mabel opened her mouth to inject something into the statement, "I wouldn't back either of you."

Stalking over to her bed, she kneeled next to it, rummaging underneath it for the bar of chocolate she knew she'd put there just a few days before. Anything to take her mind off the two senseless girls behind her…honestly, if they wanted to argue about something, they could at least choose a normal topic like whether or not the Fat Lady should be the portrait hole cover or not.

Anna and Mabel had roused from their stiff stances and had both stalked off to their respective beds, and the unmistakable sound of the hangings being drawn shut made Elise smiled smugly. Perhaps she ought to call them cows every time they got into a huff if it made them shut up so nicely.

Standing up, half-eaten chocolate bar in hand, she made her way over to the door. It was nearly time for dinner, and if she wanted to make it down there before the two girls sulking on their beds decided it was time to start their routine of hair-fixing and clothes-inspecting, she'd have to hurry.


	3. Intentions

A hand appeared from an alcove and seized Elise's shoulder, pulling her into it without a word

A hand appeared from an alcove and seized Elise's shoulder, pulling her into it without a word. Not feeling the least bit charitable toward this behavior, she turned toward her apprehender with a glare fixed on her face, ready to spit out a mouthful of words at him.

"I swear to Merlin you're going to die," a very feminine voice hissed. "You jinxed me, I know you did."

Elise started, all hopes of looking intimidating filtering away as the confusion took over. "I—what? Donna, you're crazy," she said, a bit of the glower returning as she recognized the older girl.

"You did. He just—we're—you jinxed me."

"That's what I gathered," Elise said, rolling her eyes irritably. "Who's 'he'?" She already had a good idea who 'he' was, but that didn't mean she wasn't about to ask.

A scowl was shot at her. "Sirius. I found him with—" Her voice broke off, and Elise realized that she was choking up. Good Merlin, the last thing she needed was the seventh year to start sobbing on her. In fact, maybe she should run now before she was forced to pat her on the back and console her or something. "And since you jinxed me by saying that he was going to dump—not last long."

Her eyes were visibly watering now, and Elise was starting to get more than a bit uncomfortable. "Er, yeah, I did," she said slowly, stepping backward a step away from the girl.

"There you go!" Voice shrill, Donna stared at her accusingly. "You just proved that you jinxed me."

"I didn't—"

"Course you did. How else would he have?" Stepping toward her menacingly – and it was very menacing, even if it was only due to the fact that her eyes were buggy from tears – Donna continued ranting on. "You made our whole relationship die by saying that Now you need to help me get back at him because you—you ijinxed/i me."

Elise couldn't understand this piece of logic. "So I jinxed you, which I didn't—"

"You did—"

"I ididn't/i," she said again, her voice rising over Donna's protest to finish her sentence. "So Sirius dumped you and you want me to get back at him for you?" A derisive snort escaped her.

"Yeah, that's it," Donna said with a nearly inaudible sniffle. Elise had no idea how she managed to pull of teary and threatening at the same time, but she was fairly that if she had been in Sirius' place and Donna had acted like this she would have done the same thing he did – minus the cheating, of course. "You need to get him back for me now since that's what I want you to do and you owe it to me."

Raising an eyebrow at her, Elise slowly shook her head. The girl was emotionally unstable. If she agreed she could get out of the little area and since there was the factor of emotionally instability factoring in, there was no doubt Donna wouldn't remember a moment of the incident. It was a bit like dosing her up on fire whiskey—in fact, that wouldn't be a bad idea, either.

"Alright," she said, not bothering to argue the fact that she didn't jinx the girl any more. "I'll do it." And with that she turned her back on the niche, strolling out of sight before Donna could say so much as a word more. She was sick and tired of talking to the girl, and dinner would be being served right now. After all, it was bound to be nearly six thirty--

--six thirty. The detention. Elise swore under her breath, stopping in her tracks. She'd forgotten all about it, and if she were calculating the time right she had only a few minutes to get to the Defense classroom.

Turning on her heel, she found herself face to face with a clock perched on the wall in front of her. Sure enough, it was six twenty-four. That gave her six minutes to make it to her destination, which was hardly enough.

"Damn," she swore again, breaking into a jog. The halls were nearly empty, which made the trek reasonably earlier, though with each glimpse of a clock she knew she was getting much to close to the allotted arrival time than she cared to be.

Five minutes. Four minutes. Two minutes and forty seconds. One minute. Twenty eight, twenty seven, twenty six—she burst into the classroom, panting heavily. It stunk like—well, she wasn't sure, but it didn't smell good in the least.

"Well, well," a voice that could only be described as crusty spat out. "You just made it just in time. Too bad, I was looking forward to getting some of my broom closets cleaned along with the Defense Bursting into the classroom."

Blinking into the dim lighting Elise made out the form of not Professor Thornward but the castle caretaker.

This had to be a nightmare.

"Er, good thing I was on time, then," she said, the classroom suddenly unnervingly quiet. "I mean, not for you, but…" Her voice trailed off. Merlin, she thought to herself uneasily. This wasn't like a nightmare, it sodding well iwas/i one!

"Broom. Mop." There was a loud clatter as something fell to the floor, and Elise stumbled as something vaguely handle-like jabbed her leg. "Bucket." There was a thud and a bit of sloshing as it hit the ground. "Now get to work. I expect this classroom to be scrubbed from top to bottom if it takes you all morning. No magic - Professor Thornward's orders," the little man said with a smirk clearly audible in his tone before he shuffled out, door slamming behind him.

He had to be the devil. No human would force this inhumane punishment on anyone. And what was more, Elise realized as she surveyed they classroom in the flickering light, it looked as though the last students in the room had been attempting to explode cat-sized slugs with a success rate much too high for her liking.

Picking up the broom, ignoring the bruise that was no doubt forming on her leg, Elise began poking what looked like pieces of innards into a pile. It was quite interesting. There was a bit she'd just stepped on that looked something like a stomach or kidney, and she was fairly sure there was a full intestine in the dust pile accumulated.

Oh, who was she kidding? Her stomach was turning uneasily and there was no way in hell it could be considered interesting. The mere sight of the nasty things was making her feel like she'd rather have a fifteen foot essay to do rather than this.

Elise's stomach growled loudly, reminding her of the fact that she hadn't eaten anything since noon. Dinner had been forfeited by way of detention, but she couldn't go any get anything because she had to stay in the classroom. If she were any better at transfiguration she'd transfigure herself something, but since it was her worst subject (other than Defense) she figured it wouldn't be smart. Chances were she'd end up eating ham and textbook paper in bread.

A though hit her. She could summon food, she'd learned the charm ages ago and was fairly sure she could perform it well enough to summon a single sandwich from the kitchens.

Leaning the broom against the wall, Elise picked her way around the desks on the cleanest path she could find toward the door. Once there, she opened the door a crack and poked her wand out to avoid whatever magic-sensing charms the classroom might have on it.

"Accio sand—peanut butter sandwich," she clarified in a low whisper.

Nothing happened. Not a thing was drifting toward her down the hallway, and the only sound came from Elise's own breathing and footsteps from the floor above. Frowning, she pointed her wand, prepared to do the charm again, when there was a shout.

"Oi, lookit there. What iis/i it?"

There were more footsteps and Elise froze, wand still aimed down the corridor.

"It's a—bloody hell, it got away!"

Elise caught a glimpse of a small white object careening around the corner of the corridor. It was--

"A sandwich!?" A now recognizably male voice exclaimed. Elise's stomach sunk slightly as she reached her hand upward, just managing to snag the sandwich out of midair as it turned into the classroom. The person, or rather people, she realized as what sounded like multiple sets of feet jogging down the hallway, must not have seen where the rogue sandwich had ended up.

By the sound of it they were nearing her classroom.

Closing the door enough so she could only see through a sliver of a crack, Elise held her breath. Whoever they were they certainly wasn't supposed to be out this late. The clock in the classroom said it was nearly curfew, and unless they were Slytherins there was no way they could make it back to their common room in time.

"That's the first time I've seen that. A sandwich…"

"P'raps you were just seeing things," an even voice countered. They were just about to the door, Elise could her them clear as day.

There was a snort. "Moony, I could have seen that thing without my glasses on! It was a sandwich, I'm sure of it."

They were walking in front of her door now. "You should've tried to grab it, mate," the original male voice grumbled. "I'm hungry."

It was Sirius, there was no doubt about it, with Remus Lupin and – Elise couldn't remember his name off of her head. Something Potter. They weren't in her year so she didn't go out of her way to memorize their names over the years. However, the question as to why the three boys were taking an evening stroll, not at all perturbed with the fact that they weren't in the common room was what was making her curious. Surely they didn't do this every night…

One of the boys, she couldn't tell which as they were once more out of sight, gave a dry laugh, and then they were gone, with only the sound of receding footsteps left behind.

Elise slowly shut the door, blocking out even that. She'd been clutching her sandwich and there were now four holes punched into the bread. It wouldn't have been terrible to have the boys see her, but she knew that Remus iwas/i a Prefect and even though he was out after curfew with both of his friends, they could have a reason for it. She was in detention summoning a sandwich, and even though she couldn't remember a rule against that, since when did she remember all of them? That was Russ, not her.

She took a bite. Despite the finger marks, the sandwich still tasted good.

After swallowing the last bit, she returned to sweeping – or, as she was mentally calling it, innard-jabbing. Elise was finding that the more of the nasty stuff she swept up the more she got used to it. In fact, while at first she'd had a time keeping herself from trying to vomit, she was now able to even sweep up a bit of anything without so much of a twinge – not much of one, anyway. It was a miraculous feat, in her opinion, though she still felt like wringing the neck of whichever person had managed to fully extract the innards what she'd identified as slugs, leaving a perfectly intact leathery brown skin behind.

All that was left was the mopping, Elise realized after a moment of scanning the classroom. A large pile of slug pieces sat in a wastebasket in the corner of the classroom, and she'd spent the better part of a minute searching for more to sweep up. However, since she'd ended up finding nothing, she'd decided it was time to mop.

Merlin, she was tired. All she wanted to do was go back to her dormitory, take a shower, and go to sleep. The job wasn't quite done, though, so Elise resigned herself to another half an hour at least of scrubbing sluggy floors.

As she stared at the murky recesses of the pail, she realized immediately why the caretaker was always so idirty/i If this water was an example of his version of clean, he probably considered his grimy self spotless.

Picking up the mop, Elise dipped it into the water gingerly, half expecting to take it out dripping and covered in dangling bits of seaweed. She was by no means a fanatically clean person, but she was female, and while a bit of dirt was fine, scrubbing a floor with water that didn't look like it was changed for a year was not her idea of clean. Chances were she wouldn't be able to tell the difference between the mopped and unmapped floor anyway with the state the water was in. She could go now a half an hour earlier and get to bed for a least a few hours of decent sleep.

A picture of Professor Thornward flashed into her head, overly-cheerful grin in place, telling her that she still had a piece of lung on her floor and that Elise had better go throw it away.

Elise paused from leaning the mop up against the wall before turning around and vigorously scrubbing a bit of shiny slug-substance from the floor. There was no way she was going to chance ithat/i happening – she'd seen enough pieces of slugs to last her a lifetime of lifetimes.

The next fifteen minutes of mopping seemed to drag on forever. Had there not been a clock in the room Elise would have sworn that it had taken her at least an hour to clean the floor. It might have been the fact that she had been gritting her teeth every time she swabbed the slick floor with the grimy mopping water, or perhaps it was because she'd been in the classroom for a little over six hours with only a sandwich in her stomach. Whatever it was, though, it was making time drag on slower than ever.

When she finally did step out into the corridor, she felt like rejoicing. She'd breathed enough of the thick, foul odor in the Defense classroom that she'd gotten used to it, but the airiness in the corridor felt positively glorious.

"Oi, you," a whispered voice hissed from behind a statue. "I've got something for you."

Elise just managed to stop herself from yelping by biting her lip. If that was who she thought it was…it was. Good Merlin, did Donna not want to leave her alone? "If you come any closer I'll spread slug guts on you," she hissed through gritted teeth, spitting out the first thread that came to her mind. "Why are you here, anyway? I didn't remember talling

Donna didn't seem perturbed. That could have been because her face was still mostly in shadow, though. "I'll throw it to you, then."

Elise found herself instinctively reaching out to catch whatever it was even though she didn't want anything to do with whatever the older girl was trying to give her.

"Try page thirty-three, I'm particularly fond of that one," she said as Elise found herself holding a thick, largely heavy volume. "I'm not sure how to do it, but you could, I'm sure? There're some notes about what to do, too."

Elise was about to protest that no, she didn't know how to do whatever it was in the book, that she didn't even know what she was italking/i about, when it hit her – getting back at Sirius. Perhaps she hadn't forgotten, after all.

Shit.

"Actually, I don't think I can," Elise began slowly, eyeing the girl behind the statue in a new way. Perhaps she wasn't quite as brainless she'd first made her out to be. "Y'see, I'm a year younger than you, right? How am I supposed to do…whatever it is…if you can't?"

Donna did a sort of side-to-side sway that she'd no doubt perfected to show of her long locks. Elise took to be like a shrug. "You'll have to figure something out, won't you? If you wouldn't have jinxed me..."

"I didn't," Elise growled, trying to hand the book back. She didn't want to do whatever it was Donna was trying to force on her. Good Merlin, couldn't the girl take a hint? "And I'm not going to—going to—" Her words trailed off as she yawned largely.

Donna was turning to go. Elise, tired and irritated, was determined to get in the last word after the maddening conversation. "I won't," she said, just managing to leave off a 'so there' as hurried to make it around the corner before the other Donna did. There was no way she was going to walk to the common room with the infuriatingly stubborn girl did – absolutely none.

"Thornward's detention brutal?"

Elise selected a few sausages to add to her already loaded plate before glancing up at Ted. "How'd you know I had detention?" It was a bit disconcerting to know that he knew where she'd been the previous night.

He jerked his head toward Russ, who was busily stuffing his face with deviled eggs. Ah, so that was how. No wonder. Elise's mouth twitched upward. "Terrible." At the questioning look shot at her, she elaborated. "I had to scrub her classroom. Someone had been bursting foot long slugs…innards everywhere, y'know. A bit nasty."

Before he could say anything back, someone began chuckling behind her. Spinning around as best as she could in her seat, Elise was surprised to see Jonnie D, amused expression on his face. She hadn't thought him to be the type that would laugh at such a thing. He seemed…well, beyond it. Apparently not, though.

"That sounds very Thornward," he said in his fabulously smooth voice. "She's got quite a few nasty detentions up her sleeve if you get on her bad side."

It was the most Elise had ever heard him say since she'd met him, and she was finding it hard not to gape. "Er, yeah," she said after a few seconds of not being able to think of a thing to say. Jonnie D still had a sort of half-smirk on, but was sliding into a seat a few spaces down from her. Turning back to the table herself, Elise just managed to catch the tail end of the conversation that had occurred in the few second she'd been gawking at the amount of words coming from Jonnie D's mouth.

"Gryffindors?" Hearing the word spoken, she cocked an eyebrow at the boys. "I've had enough of Gryffindors for a lifetime." Mind wandering back to the multiple run-ins with Donna, she grimaced. Enough of one certain Gryffindor was more like it.

"Oi, fellows," she said suddenly, remembering the book Donna had given her. The previous night she'd gone to sleep immediately after showering and hadn't given it a second thought, shoving it in her bag for safekeeping. Being Sunday, however, they didn't have any classes to go to and Elise was willing to take full advantage of the situation.

Flipping it open to the page Donna had specified, she shoved the book forward. The three of them – Russell, Ted, Jonnie D – leaned forward to inspect it.

There was a moment of silence in which they read the page. Elise watched them, unable to see it herself, until suddenly—

"Brilliant idea," Ted said, staring at her with dancing eyes.

"S'not against the rules either," Russell added excitedly.

"Complex but doable," came Jonnie D's sage opinion.

Elise found herself grinning as she pulled the book toward her to read it. "Excellent, now let me read it."


End file.
